PRODUCT OF ITS CONNECTIONS
Watershed, the link between land and water, serves as Platte's collection agency.
MAX PSOT VAN DER BURG
To understand how a watershed works, picture a raindrop plummeting to the ground near Kearney.
On this particular day, the ground is saturated from a rainstorm, and our raindrop is one of the last to fall. It joins other raindrops and helps to form a rivulet. Other trickles develop nearby and merge into a network of capillaries that flow into Dry Creek.
Still receiving an influx of rainwater from throughout its watershed, Dry Creek meanders into the Wood River, which has been collecting water of its own. The two streams mingle and flow into the Platte River.
In general, watersheds collect water from all across a landscape and move it to a central location, like a river or lake. But watersheds collect more than surface water.
In the Nebraska Sandhills, for example, the soil is composed of sandy material that allows rainwater to seep into the Ogallala Aquifer - essentially a vast underground reservoir. Rivers like the North and South Loup receive most of their initial input as discharge from springs connected to this aquifer. Because the land around these rivers collects water and moves it to a reservoir, it can still be considered a watershed.
No matter where the water comes from, watersheds are the link between land and water. And a river like the Platte is the product of all such connections.
Originating in melting snow, the North and South Platte rivers begin life flowing through Rocky Mountain watersheds in Colorado. They gather groundwater from nearby aquifers and surface water flowing from cities, fields and smaller creeks and rivers. The North and South Platte join near the city of North Platte, creating the Platte River.
By the time the Platte empties into the Missouri at Plattsmouth, it has drained roughly two-thirds of the state, providing a source for irrigation, hydropower and drinking water. The aquifer tied to the Platte also supplies a majority of the state's drinking water.
But water in the Platte is only as good as the watersheds to which it is linked. Because water must flow over land and through other streams before reaching the Platte, anything that water contacts - including pesticides, motor oil and fertilizer-will end up in the river.
That contamination affects more than humans. The Platte provides food and roosting areas for millions of migrating birds. It also provides habitat for four endangered or threatened species. The quality and quantity of water allotted for wildlife and humans are a balance between what the watershed puts in and what we take out.
So watersheds do more than occupy space around rivers. They are integrated parts of the landscape where living communities, human or otherwise, congregate based on a mutual need for water.
